


Choke me in the Shallow Water

by ace_corvid



Series: All's fair in Ketterdam [1]
Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Six of Crows Fusion, And none of it is between Roman and Virgil, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon typical to Six of Crows, Creativity | Roman "Princey" Sanders Angst, Human Trafficking, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Underage Sex, Inej!Roman, Just tagging for safety really, Kaz!Virgil, M/M, Poor Creativity | Roman "Princey" Sanders, Six of Crows AU, The Menagerie, There's nothing explicit in this fic, This is not as bad as the tagging makes it sound, Whump, but it does deal with some heavy topics, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-26
Updated: 2020-04-26
Packaged: 2021-03-02 00:06:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23855830
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ace_corvid/pseuds/ace_corvid
Summary: They like the fear. It makes them feel powerful. It makes Roman seem weak, easy to break.Before this, he didn't think he was.(Roman doesn't like to think of his time in Ketterdam before the Dregs.)
Relationships: Anxiety | Virgil Sanders/Creativity | Roman "Princey" Sanders, Pre-Relationship - Relationship
Series: All's fair in Ketterdam [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1259972
Comments: 18
Kudos: 30





	Choke me in the Shallow Water

**Author's Note:**

> Gonna be completely honest I forgot I had this au, but then the Roman playlist got me itching for some angst and I got a message on Tumblr and it just kind of spiralled.  
> It's not like I've got anything else to do in quaratine.

The collar is made of fine silk, but it's choking Roman anyway.

It's breathable fabric... see-through fabric. The latter is fitting, considering how transparent he feels, put on display like an object. The former is less so, considering how he cannot breath. He tries to still the tremors in his hands, but Roman's control does not extend to his shaky breaths.

The costume he's been forced into is a mockery, riddled with inaccuracies of his culture that only aggravate the wrongness that had already taken up residence in his chest. It is not the worst of it; far from it, but it only serves to add insult to injury. The synthetics wrapped around his neck feel unnatural in a way that irritates the ache in his chest. He'd feel like a child playing dress up, except no child should have to see the things that he has had to see, and feel the things that he has had to suffer.

Except, he had been a child, had he not? When this all began? All wide eyes and innocence. A childhood of being caught when he had fell. Saints knew, he had ceased to be a child since. Or maybe the Saints don't know. Looking around, it wouldn't be hard to believe they had turned a blind eye to him.

He catches a glimpse of himself in the mirror. He doesn't look like a proud Suli. He doesn't even look like a not-child. He just looks scared.

Very scared.

It had been a long and hard lesson to learn that that was what was attractive to these men. Sick men with 'exotic' tastes, with coin to spare; that's who frequents the menagerie. They call him the Suli Lynx, after the big cat, the predator, but it's a joke. Roman knows he's prey. Knows it's the men who are the predators here.

They like the fear. It makes them feel powerful. It makes Roman seem weak, easy to break.

Before this, he didn't think he was.

He may still not be, but there's not much hope. It's easier to let them think that, though, so he plays the part. He secludes into himself, as if being silent would make him smaller, but their eyes never quite pass over him once they get a look. The clear answer, then, would be do not let them look, but Roman fears Tante Heleen just as much as he fears these men's hands.

And yet, still, as he walks around the room, he walks silently, fingers crossed tight that he isn't noticed. He'd once loved attention, from the top of a high wire, but these eyes are different. No one should be looked at like this, but it's all Roman knows now.

Tante Heleen told him that he was a lynx, that he should prowl. Roman had a gracefulness gifted to him by the saints, but even he still looked like an awkward teenager who'd rather be anywhere else when he'd tried. None of the pleasure seekers really seem to mind, all the same. They had their eyes on different things.

He silently saunters past a customer, prayers still on his lips, but Roman notices out of the corner of his eye that the customer looks different. He's so startingly out of place that Roman near stops in his tracks. It's interesting enough for him to really look at the man with the gilded cane; not rich enough to look exorbitant like the merchants, but he cleans up well. He looks too sharp to be well fed, but he doesn't look hungry either. His hands are gloved. The face is too young for that of a pleasure seeker, as well. Or maybe barrel boys just learn young.

Nonetheless, it's been a little while since Roman had been around someone his own age. He still couldn't decide if seeing one again, in a situation like this, was something to be glad for.

And yet, when his eyes meet Roman's, they don't look predatory. Clever, definitely; eyes like that don't miss anything. But he doesn't look lustful, as his mouth falls open in quiet surprise. It's an expression that doesn't seem familiar to his face, like he's almost surprised about the fact that he is surprised. It strikes Roman with the quiet urge to laugh; something he hasn't felt in the Menagerie since he first found himself trapped here.

“Did you just sneak up on me?” Startlingly, his voice was gravel, with a tone that didn't broker any insight to what he felt about the matter. Roman was vaguely startled to note that he didn't feel nervous around him, for someone who looked so dangerous.

“Of course not, I simply walked.” Roman tried to smile, but Roman's smile had been sickly since the slavers ship. “Perhaps you should be more aware of your surroundings?”

If this man- boy, really, had truly been a pleasure seeker, he might have been slapped or worse, for that slight against him. As it was, the boy's face twisted up into a smirk that suited him much more than the shock had. For only a moment, they could have been two perfectly normal kids in the street, and the absurdity of it was strangely comforting.

“Perhaps I should be.” His tone was amused, but Roman could almost imagine it sounded agreeable. “But there are many in the Barrel who are less aware than I, as it is. You should be careful with a talent like that.”

“You call this a talent?” Roman took the chance to preen, a sliver of his old self yearning for the chance to take pride. “You should see me when I'm not in chains.”

The stranger's eyes narrowed in interest, so different from what Roman had become used to. Roman hadn't realized how long it had been since he had been looked at like a person. “Perhaps I should.”

A bolt of delightful panic shot through Roman as he realized that this could be his chance. He could be free of the Menagerie _forever_. This boy could be his ticket back home, to find his family.

“Maybe I could even be of use to you.” Roman tried to sound detached, but if this was his only hope he had to take it.

The hope quickly died as he saw Tante Heleen approach. Her smile stretched across her teeth like a shark, but the only thing sharp about her was the cut of her gems on her necklace. She didn't need to be sharp to cut.

“My darling,” she crooned, digging her awful long nails into his cheek as she caressed him. The boys eyes never left Roman as he tensed instinctively beneath her touch, trying not to flinch; it'd be far worse for him later if he did. “Don't you have something better to be doing that bothering guests? Go see to the customers now.”

Tante Heleen, with that, offered a hand to the strange boy, to lead him into her office. He stared at the offending appendage for a moment, maybe two, leaving it just long enough to let the rejection stew, before he ambled into her office on his own, not waiting for her to follow. Her gaze turned deadly for a seconde, before marching in after him. Even when the expression was not directed at him, it still sent shivers down Roman's spine.

And just as quickly as it was lit, the hope was extinguished. The smothered flame only left smoke to choke him further. But it was ok. Roman was learning how to live without breathing.

Roman didn't know how long he stood there, listless, before he became aware of the man lumbering towards him from behind, and this time didn't bother to hide the flinch when the man placed his hand on his shoulder.

The boy walked out of the office alone, eyes finding Roman again almost immediately. They quickly went to the figure behind his back, sharpening, and in a haze of dizzying surprise, the hand disappeared, and the figure left in a manner that suggested he was trying not to run.

Almost as quickly as he'd came, he nodded to him, doffed his hat and left. No one bothered Roman for the rest of the night.

The next morning, the boy was back. Tante Heleen was seething.

The two did not seem unrelated.

The boy smiled. It wasn't a nice thing. He looked similar to how he had yesterday, a different shirt, but the same coat, same gloves. Still dangerous in that weird way that didn't feel particularly threatening. Eventually his features settled into the familiar smirk also. “How well can you climb?”

A sound of glass smashing echoed from the office. Roman jumped. The boy did not.

“I grew up on a tightrope. I've been balancing longer than you've been walking, so. Pretty well.”

“In theory?” His tone could be scathing if Roman couldn't pick up the slight teasing undertone. Roman didn't think anyone who asked such strange questions with no context had any right to look so smug while barely moving his face. 

“In practice.” This was the most confidence Roman had had since he'd been trapped in the menagerie. He'd always tried to hold his head high, but most customers liked him demure, and the ones who wanted him to fight back were worse.

“How are you with a dagger?” The boy asked, looking Roman in the eye properly now.

“I've never had reason to learn before.” It was an avoidance. Roman didn't admit he'd never wanted to.

“Come with me, then.” He replied, as Tante Heleen continued to screech in her office. What had this boy done? Had he bought his indenture, or something worse? Roman wasn't sure he could stomach knowing. “I'll give you plenty reason to learn.”

“Who even are you?” Roman finally asked, ignoring the offer for a moment.

“They call me Anxiety. I work in the Dregs.” That sounded familiar enough. People talked of him often in the Barrel. “I have your indenture and I suppose I could just rip it into a thousand pieces.”

Roman's heart caught in his throat. “But?”

“But my boss won't be happy knowing I threw money away. Not that I can't handle that, but you did say that you could be of some use to me.”

Anxiety offered him a dagger hilt-first. It was a deceptively pretty thing, shiny metal and all. Roman too, liked to think he was a deceptively pretty thing. He could be dangerous. He could be useful. But then again, at what cost? If there was anything Roman had learned in this city of sin, it was that everything had a price.

What did he have to lose, though? What had he already lost, to feel a kinship with a dagger?

He'd ask the saints to help him, but maybe they already had. Had they sent Anxiety to give him a second chance? A mission, even.

So many boys and girls, just like him on slavers ships. All he had to do first, was repay a debt.

“And I meant it.” Roman replied. He took the dagger, a saints name already on his lips. “What do you need me to do?”

“Are you sure?" Anxiety's voice was not unkind, but it was firm. "You'd be a member of the dregs, and we're a gang. That means crime of all kinds, a fun little variety. I can't promise you'll leave without blood on your hands, if you even manage to leave alive.”

“Then what can you promise?”

“Freedom. You could be the most feared spider in all of Ketterdam. And don't worry about having to take the crow and cups; I won't be the one to mark you again.”

A kindness Roman hadn't expected from a barrel boss. But then, what about this was expected?

“Sounds good to me, Anxiety.” Roman says, and he means it. The apprehension loosens in his chest, and the dagger begins to feel a little less alien in his hand. He'd like to try being dangerous. He shakes Anxiety's hand, ignoring the voice in his head that screamed this was a bad idea.

Roman's father had taught him to fall from the tightrope.

No one ever taught him how to fall from grace.

**Author's Note:**

> you can find me at:  
> Tumblr: ace-corvid.tumblr.com  
> Twitter: twitter.com/ace_corvid  
> come yell at me!
> 
> thank you so much for reading, see you next time! And if you enjoyed this, a comment would really make my day!


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